President Pinochet Presides Over a Ruthless Regime

The coup was led by a four-man junta headed by
Army Chief of Staff Augusto Pinochet, who eventually assumed the office of
president. Committed to eliminating Marxism the junta suspended
parliament, banned political activity, and severely curbed civil
liberties. Pinochet's brutal dictatorship led to the imprisonment,
torture, disappearances, execution, and expulsion of thousands of
Chileans. A government report in 2004 indicated that almost 28,000 people
had been tortured during his rule, and at least 3,200 murders and
disappearances had taken place.

The economy, in tatters under Allende's
Socialist revolution, gradually improved after Chile's return to
privatization under Pinochet. In 1989, Pinochet lost a plebiscite on
whether he should remain in power. He stepped down in Jan. 1990 in favor
of Patricio Aylwin. In Dec. 1993, Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, the candidate
of a center-left coalition and son of a previous president, was elected
president.

Pinochet, who had retained his post as army
commander in chief after the 1989 plebiscite, retired in March 1998. In
Oct. 1998, he was arrested and detained in England on an extradition
request issued by a Spanish judge who sought Pinochet in connection with
the disappearances of Spanish citizens during his rule. British courts
ultimately denied his extradition, and Pinochet returned to Chile in March
2000. He died in Dec. 2006 at age 91, before facing trial for the abuses
of his 17-year dictatorship.